Witness at Condric Trial Describe Prisoner Abuse at Polet Stadium
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Condric, a former member of military police of the Croatian Defense Council, has been charged with abusing a detainee on the premises of an old police building in Bosanski Brod and beating another person in a prison located in the storage room of the Beograd department store, in collaboration with another soldier.
Condric has also been charged with allowing two Croatian Defense Council soldiers to rape a woman in the boiler room of the Polet football club stadium in Bosanski Brod in late July or early August 1992.
A protected witness known as MC-1 said he was a member of the military police of the Croatian Defense Council based at the Polet football club in Bosanski Brod in May 1992.
According to MC-1, there were two rooms in which men and women were held, specifically the locker rooms of the former football club.
“The women were always locked up. I didn’t have a chance to go into that room. I entered the room in which the men were held several times, when it was my turn to bring them food,” MC-1 explained.
MC-1 said he had information that some male detainees were taken to the military police command for interrogations, but said he’d never personally witnessed or attended the interrogations.
“What I could see was that some of the detainees had bruises on their faces. That’s the only thing I remember,” MC-1 said.
MC-1 said he knew Condric from the military police. He said he used to see Condric at a checkpoint located on a bridge in Bosanski Brod, as well as during the handover of shifts.
Testifying as a defense witness, Dr. Cazim Karusic confirmed having made a medical report on a Polet detainee on July 27, 1992. He said the report indicated that a patient, whose name was not read aloud in the courtroom, had an injury of the vertebra, so he was advised to stay in bed and take painkillers.
Karusic said the injury could have been caused by a hit.
“In this report I can see that there was no open wound or fracture. Although I don’t remember this patient, he certainly wasn’t wounded, because the medical report would have been different in that case,” Karusic explained.
The trial will continue on July 1, when Mato Condric will also appear as a witness.
